Acrylic Recap

Learning is a process and I definitely learned some new things last week.

1. Remember to check the opaqueness/transparency of paint! Some paints are solid, without any amount of transparency. Others are transparent, having more of a stained glass effect when it dries. Others are halfway between opaque and transparent-translucent. There is a dark purple color that I dribbled on top of the blue base...which I had originally planned to be a bright magenta-ish purple. But when it dried it darkened because it was translucent and the blue underneath darkened the color. Also, the extra water I added to make the paint more fluid, thinned out the color. I still wanted some bright colors to capture the spontaneity and excitement of splashing in puddles, so I added the orange and yellow.

2. Acrylic paint darkens when it dries. I had lots of surprises with colors this week! Haha..never quite knew what to expect.

3. How fluid mediums work. You can't just add water to acrylic paint to thin it, because it affects the amount of pigment in the paint. So, in order to thin or thicken paint, you can buy different types of mediums to adjust it accordingly...and it doesn't change the quality or the pigment of the paint. You can do so much with the medium, and I've only just scratched the surface. I'm excited to try different things!

4. I love texture!
See the white triangular tool on the very right? That is a palette knife. You can use it to scoop up paint and put it onto your pallet. But you can also use it like a paintbrush and smear on the paint onto the canvas with the pallet knife. That's what I did for the dark blue base. You can't really tell in the photo of the piece, but it adds a certain texture and variety that cannot be achieved with a brush. I absolutely loved using it!

I decided to use cardboard for the footprints to make it seem like the bottom ridges of rain boots. It was kind of therapeutic scraping off the layer, row by row. Some brainless activity-not having to think about what colors to use, how to mix the paint to get the right color, etc.


Anyway, it was a learning experience and I am excited to have started this project! I've come up with an idea for this next week's project and went shopping for the materials today. Subject is dandelions! :)